Note 19 — THE COMPLETE PLAYS OF ROBERT GREENE

Though we accept the theory of the early composition of A Looking-Glass we fail to follow the arguments of Fleay and Gayley, derived from the introduction of Perimedes (licensed 29th March 1588), that in "the mad priest of the sun," mentioned in connection with Atheist Tamburlaine, Greene can have any reference to the priests of Rasni in Act iv. Scene 3. Certainly Greene could not have held up such tame heroics for comparison with Marlowe's vigorous declamation. Careful scrutiny fails to show that Greene was mentioning a work of his own. The mad priests of the sun would seem rather to be other products of the pen of Marlowe, or to be the work of some other dramatist, possibly Kyd, whom, with Marlowe, Greene was attacking. (See Koeppel in Herrig's Archiv, 102, p. 357.)